Table of contents for December 2022 in Custom PC UK

The first of 2022’s autumnal flurry of hardware launches is upon us, and it’s a bit good. AMD has once again pulled out a blinder of a CPU architecture with Zen 4 (see p64). The single-threaded performance is huge, and the multi-threaded performance is even bigger. Even the clock speed, which has previously been a weak point for AMD, is genuinely hitting 5.7GHz – there’s no merely theoretical boost clock nonsense here. Again, AMD’s chiplet approach has paid off, with AMD able to make a highly scalable system using a single die design built on TSMC’s 5nm process, while Intel is still languishing at 10nm. The new I/O chip (IOD) has also been overhauled, being built on a 6nm process and incorporating an integrated GPU. What’s more, as James Gorbold…

SUPPLIER custompc.co.uk/FusionRX This Fusion-RX system might share magazine space with AMD’s new Zen 4 processors, but PC Specialist’s rig aims to prove that there’s still life in Zen 3 silicon yet, especially in mid-range systems. The familiar Ryzen 5 5600X deploys six SMT-enabled cores with a top speed of 4.6GHz, and the CPU underpins a Gigabyte GeForce RTX 3070 card, which overclocks the GPU boost clock from 1725MHz to 1815MHz. You also get 16GB of dual-channel memory, along with a 2TB SSD. Corsair’s TX750M PSU is reliable thanks to a semi-modular design and 80 Plus Gold certification. Those components don’t set the world alight, but they’re good for the price, and they’ll handle mainstream games fine. The motherboard isn’t bad either. The Gigabyte B550 Aorus Elite AX V2 looks good…

SUPPLIER thumbsup.com The Orb Case-X is so wildly ostentatious that it’s impossible not to be in awe of it. It’s a gamepad case that contains a 5,200mAh power bank to recharge your pad when it’s not in use. The Case-X allows you to carry your gamepad around like you might do a snooker cue or a fishing tackle box. Then, when you get to the place where you want to play games, you pop the clasps, lift the lid and remove the pad to the wonder of any onlookers. There’s not a lot of practicality here, but there’s utility – the padding keeps your pad safe, and you can charge devices inside or outside of the box. There’s even a carrying handle, giving it the appearance of a tiny nuclear…

SUPPLIER currys.co.uk We’ve generally been impressed with EPOS’ (previously Sennheiser) gaming headsets, with the GSP 300 still topping our Elite list for budget wired headsets. The new H3Pro Hybrid is at the other end of the scale, though, with a premium price and lots of features. The H3Pro Hybrid is a smarter, sleeker looking unit than previous GSP models. The three colour options – black and dark blue, white and light grey, and dark green and gold – are relatively subtle. Previously, the GSP range used a wide, split headband design that was less elegant than the single-piece design here. We expected this to compromise comfort, as the split design was excellent at distributing the headset’s weight, but the H3Pro Hybrid’s memory foam padding proved very comfortable. The same goes…

SUPPLIER box.co.uk Perhaps the most obvious aspect of the Roccat Syn Pro Air is its surprisingly low price. Widely available for £100 inc VAT, it still offers several extras. There’s the prominent RGB lighting, the detachable, rotating, auto-muting microphone, a dedicated game/chat mix dial and more. The overall design is quite conventional, with a traditional padded headband, sliding side arms for fit adjustment, and earcups that rotate left and right to fold flat. However, the arm adjustments aren’t notched but move smoothly. This makes them easy to adjust when the Syn Pro Air is on your head, but they’re not the most secure and they’ll need adjusting each time you wear them. Overall comfort levels are middling. The headband is quite narrow and the padding, while reasonably soft, isn’t on…

Hey you there, with the face! Want to play a game where Superman fights Shaggy from Scooby Doo? Such is the rallying cry of MultiVersus, a fighting game in the vein of Nintendo’s Smash Bros series that takes every licensed character in Warner Bros’ Raiders of the Lost Ark-style vault and pits them against one another in colourful, chaotic brawls. See Batman battle the Iron Giant, Arya Stark fight the Tasmanian Devil, Tom & Jerry punch it out against … Lebron James? Oh, he was in the terrible Space Jam sequel. Now I understand. MultiVersus has been an enormous hit, which isn’t entirely surprising. ‘What if x fought Y?’ scenarios have made for fine entertainment for years. It isn’t hard to imagine Roman soldiers hunched over a campfire arguing who…

The free and open-source RISC-V instruction set architecture is pretty mainstream these days, at least in some sectors. It’s proven a smash hit with the microcontroller crowd, with Espressif going so far as to declare every chip it designs from here on out will be RISC-V. It’s also displacing proprietary Arm cores in storage devices and graphics cards. Plus, as last month’s review of the StarFive VisionFive showed, it’s now even making an appearance in near desktop-class single-board computers that cost less than a second mortgage. It’s not quite there yet though. As in the early days of Arm-based single-board computers (SBCs) – and, it could be argued, even today – there’s the thorny issue of software compatibility. When a company releases an SBC into the market, they all too…

TOTAL PROJECT TIME / 2 HOURS While it’s usually easy enough to fill up a reservoir these days, doing this in close proximity to your hardware, or with your PC powered on, can be hazardous, as well as inconvenient. Even after you’ve filled the reservoir and primed your loop, air bubbles can take hours or even days to work their way to the reservoir where they’re trapped, eventually seeing its coolant level drop. A far easier way to fill or top up your reservoir is to use a fill port. Any spills will then happen away from your components, and you won’t even need to open your case’s side panel. Installing one is a simple job, plus the port itself will only cost you a few quid. In this guide,…

To enter your rig for possible inclusion in Readers’ Drives, your build needs to be fully working and, ideally, based in the UK. Simply send us a couple of photos on Twitter (@CustomPCMag) or Facebook (CPCMagazine), or email low-res ones to ben.hardwidge@raspberrypi.com. Fame isn’t the only prize; you’ll also get your hands on some fabulous prizes, courtesy of Corsair. Corsair Hydro X Series XD3 RGB Pump/Reservoir C The Corsair Hydro X Series XD3 RGB Pump/Reservoir Combo features a high-performance DDC PWM pump, integrated RGB lighting and in-loop temperature sensor to drive even the most compact custom cooling systems. It has a high-performance Xylem DDC PWM pump controlled via PWM to deliver the perfect flow balance for your loop. There are also 16 individually addressable RGB LEDs, which light up the…

A PSU may put in a decade of service before being replaced, but if you’re looking at upgrading to a next-gen graphics card, or even a current-gen card as prices continue to fall, you need to be aware of the benefits of the ATX 3 standard. Otherwise, you might find yourself with a PC that shuts off unexpectedly, even if its wattage seems sufficient. This is exactly what happened to me. Early in the summer, I jumped on a Radeon RX 6900 XT graphics card, as the prices had fallen below MSRP. The Seasonic website told me my old Focus PX 750W 80 Plus Platinum PSU was good to go. All great, I thought, but then my PC randomly switched off during games. Even enabling Radeon Chill and limiting…

SUPPLIER amazon.co.uk The Lucifer T2 earbuds from Black Shark bring the angular illuminated aesthetic of gaming peripherals directly into your ears. It’s a bold design choice, but the Lucifer T2 keeps it practical, using the LEDs to indicate charge levels. The earbuds themselves are comfortable and just about stable enough, but they fall short of a good fit. The sound quality is respectable, being very clear for audiobooks or podcasts, while slightly weaker in the mid and lower tones. Battery life is solid – the earbuds last for five hours when fully charged and the on-board battery in the case is good for another 15 hours. Meanwhile, the controls rely on double-tapping a concealed button, rather than using a single press for pausing or playing, which reduces the chances of…

MOTHERBOARDS TEST PROCESSORS › Angle-ri AMD AM5 AMD Ryzen 9 7950X › Angle-ri Intel LGA1700 Intel Core i5-12600K › Angle-ri Intel LGA1700 mini-ITX Intel Core i7-12700K We use a GeForce RTX 3070, plus a WD Black SN850 SSD (LGA1700) or Kingston Renegade SSD (AM5) to test the speed of M.2 ports and heatsink performance. For memory, we use 16GB of Corsair 3466MHz Vengeance RGB Pro DDR4 RAM, 32GB of Corsair 5200MHz Dominator Platinum DDR5 RAM (LGA1700) or 32GB of G.Skill Trident Z Neo EXPO RAM (AM5). All CPUs are cooled by a Corsair Hydro-X water-cooling loop with two XR5 240mm radiators, an XD3 RGB reservoir and an XC7 RGB waterblock. We test with our RealBench suite and Far Cry 6 on Windows 11. We test each board’s M.2 ports with…

SUPPLIER amazon.co.uk The Delta S Wireless is the only headset on test to maintain more of a traditional gamer aesthetic and bulky desktop-centric design. It has very deep and wide earcups, but it only weighs 310g. That’s not the lightest weight on test but it’s not the heaviest either. The large earcups provide loads of room for your ears, ensuring they don’t get squashed. Having so much earcup space can result in a headset sloshing around on your head but the Asus’ headband maintains a firm grip, plus the pleather finish on the earcup padding helps them not to slip. They’re not the most breathable pads, but a set of replacement fabric pads are included in the box that allow more air through them. Although the triangle design of the…

SUPPLIER logitech.com Logitech’s G735 is a sleek, stylish affair aimed just as much at travelling as PC gaming. It’s also only currently available in white. You can customise the headset with lime green or pink earpads and mic arm (£17 inc VAT for a set) but there’s no black version. Opting for white only is a risky choice, but the G735’s design is otherwise rather special. Even compared with the EPOS H3Pro Hybrid and Razer Barracuda, which have similar street-ready aspects to their design, the G735 is seriously sleek. The headband is effortlessly elegant as it broadens gently towards its middle, then slims down to a single polished steel pivot point upon which the earcups spin. The addition of braille markings on the headband, to indicate left and right, is…

SUPPLIER currys.co.uk SteelSeries has recently refreshed the acclaimed design of its Arctis headsets, and the result is more cluttered. The main culprit is the addition of a secondary circular bump to the earcup, on top of the main lozenge shape. The controls are clustered on the sides of these bumps, making them convenient to find, but more visible than on the old Arctis design. Magnetically attached discs cap the earcups, and removing them reveals nothing. There’s no hole to store the USB dongle or a replaceable battery, for instance. Instead, the caps can be used to stylise your headset, with replacement packs of caps and elastic headbands (red, green, purple and pink) available for £30 inc VAT. Although build quality is solid enough, the look and feel of the earcups,…

DEVELOPER Two Point Studios/PUBLISHER SEGA Released in 2018, Two Point Hospital was a delightful modernisation of the distinctly British style of management sim pioneered by Bullfrog in the 1990s. For the sequel, Two Point Studios has applied this template to an entirely different type of institution – universities. Two Point Campus puts you in charge of a network of higher-education facilities across its fictional Two Point County. You need to construct the university’s facilities, laying out lecture theatres, tuition rooms, student dormitories and so on, while also managing the college’s everyday affairs, such as hiring and firing staff, organising annual courses and arranging events. The visual style is virtually identical to that of Two Point Hospital, and the game sports a similarly goofy humour and eye for detail. Almost every…

Fans of super-fast frame rates will love this fantastic prize from the generous folks at iiyama this month. Control the game with the 240Hz G-Master GB2790QSU Gold. Packed with the latest technologies, including FreeSync Premium, the 27in Gold Phoenix features a 240Hz refresh rate and a stunning 1ms MPRT response time, making sure your equipment will never hold you back. Its fast IPS panel technology guarantees superb image quality, and the ability to adjust brightness and the dark shades with the Black Tuner delivers greater viewing performance in shadowed areas. To ensure comfort during marathon gaming sessions, you can also easily adjust the screen position to your preferences thanks to the height-adjustable stand. WORTH £430! • 27in IPS panel • 240Hz refresh rate • FreeSync Premium • 1ms response time…

This issue marks the start of Q4, a time when tech companies positively fall over themselves to launch new products in time for the peak shopping season to come. The first company off the blocks this year is AMD, with its Ryzen 7000-series processors, but there are plenty more new products to follow. By the time you read this, Intel will have announced its 13th-gen Core processors and Nvidia will have announced its next-gen GeForce graphics cards. AMD’s next-gen Radeon graphics cards aren’t all that far off either. With such extensive editorial coverage in this issue, there’s little value in recounting the specs and capabilities of AMD’s new Zen 4 microarchitecture in my column. However, in case you’ve not read everything yet, let me give my own personal summary. AMD…

RG BARJY Thank you for the excellent Labs test on fans this month. I have just bought a Thermaltake P8 case, which is awesome, and needed to buy some more LED fans (the P8 can take 18 x 120mm fans!). I went with your recommendation of the Deepcool 120s, with five available for £35 from Amazon. I had no idea what I was getting into though. I assumed that most fans and LEDs would follow a connection standard, rather than offering proprietary and incompatible systems – this is a PC and not an Apple system after all. Anyway, these fans had all the cables and adaptors to connect them to my Corsair Commander Pro for the PWM control, and the RGB 12V header on my motherboard for the LEDs. So…

SUPPLIER amazon.co.uk The Kensington UH1400P is a USB Type-C-based laptop dock that adds an array of connection options in a relatively tiny package. It’s a very small, sleek device, which makes it a practical carrying companion for a laptop when out and about. The loadout includes four USB 3 ports, 4K at 60Hz HDMI video, Gigabit Ethernet and both SD and microSD readers – essentially, all the sockets a practical working laptop might need. Meanwhile, an optional power adaptor not only provides power to the connected devices, but can also recharge your laptop. The power adaptor does add a chunk to the overall bulk and the price tag, but it can be handy depending on how you use your laptop setup. It’s not cheap, but this is a small, sleek…

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SUPPLIER johnlewis.com Corsair’s HS80 is among the cheapest headsets in this test, at just under £110 inc VAT. The design is on the chunkier side, with a wide headband and large, slightly angular earcups. However, the styling is quite subtle, with just plain black or white finishes available, and small illuminated Corsair sail logos on each earcup being the only addition. The sail logos can be set to show various lighting effects, or a custom colour to match your system’s other lighting, via Corsair’s iCUE software. Meanwhile, a thin ring of light around the tip of the microphone indicates when it’s muted (red) or live (white). The HS80 uses a fixed headband with an adjustable elastic strap for both cushioning the top of your head and adjusting the fit of…

SUPPLIER ebuyer.com Razer’s Barracuda misses out on the ANC and THX AAA amplifier of its Pro-branded range sibling, but still has Bluetooth and internal microphones, plus it adds an extra feature in the form of an analogue 3.5mm input. It’s aimed squarely at the emerging market for premium, multipurpose headsets, with a tag line of ‘home gaming, street living’. It’s only available in black, and there’s not even a hint of a coloured highlight – unlike the Logitech G735, you can’t even accessorise the Barracuda with colourful extras. It’s a neat look of which we approve. The clean lines of the earcups’ outer surfaces – adorned only by a shiny black Razer logo hidden among the otherwise matt black finish – and the simple headband look effortlessly cool, and the…

TOTAL PROJECT TIME / 2 HOURS There’s a good reason why high-airflow cases point their front fans at your graphics card, as any extra airflow in its direction can improve cooling. It’s little wonder, then, that some cases have added fan mounts to the PSU cover in order to point airflow directly at your graphics card’s cooling fans, as any extra help here can often yield noticeable GPU cooling and clock speed improvements. If your case has a PSU cover, and you’re up for some case modding, then adding a PSU cover fan to blow at your GPU can shave several degrees off its load temperature. In this guide, we’ll show you how to create your own PSU cover fan mount using basic tools, and take you through where to…

CPC: Let’s start at the beginning. What inspired you to build this PC? Steve: I’ve been building PCs for 30 years for myself, family, friends and so on, but I’d never actually got round to building a custom loop. I’d looked at some of the creations featured in Custom PC and thought‘I wish I could do that’. I’d messed around with a series of AIO coolers in the preceding years, but with my 50th birthday approaching, I decided I was going to take the plunge. I’m self-employed and do a lot of my work via online conferencing – the aesthetics angle might be considered secondary to performance, but my PC is in the background when I’m conferencing. My previous builds have been a good talking point when speaking with potential…